


The Black Blade, Reforged

by burnmeumi



Category: Sword Art Online (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Character Death, Fix-It, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Internalized Transphobia, Trans Character, Trans Female Character, Triggers, Unreliable Narrator, acrhive warnings and rating may change as I write, implied suicidal ideation, when sugou gets introduced he's gonna' be a creep
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-19 21:10:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17009265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burnmeumi/pseuds/burnmeumi
Summary: To someone like Kirigaya Kyo-Kazuto, escaping the real world for the virtual one as a new reality is a dream come true. But when Kayaba Akihiko announces that he—Kirito—and almost 20,000 other people are trapped in Sword Art Online as their new reality, Kirito remembers. Even the greatest of dreams can quickly become the worst of nightmares.





	1. This Is Reality

『In your inventories there will be a gift from me. Please, confirm this.』

Kayaba Akihiko's menacing, shapeless form over the courtyard of the «Town of Beginnings», his faceless countenance weighing down on us all. All ~twenty-thousand players—early adopters of the «NerveGear» and the world's first commercial «FullDive» experience gazed skyward in confusion.  _A gift?_  we were all thinking.  _Why would He, this madman that trapped twenty-thousand human beings in his own virtual space, be giving us gifts?_

Regardless, or perhaps because this man—this…  _«God»_  ordered us to, all of us swiped our hands in the downward motion to open up our player menus and navigated to our inventory.

And right there, above everything else—even our beginner armour and starting weapon—was a single, innocuous item.

_**«Hand Mirror»** _

Confusion, I could tell, rang through the plaza. A hand mirror? That was his gift?

Without any reason to, but not seeing any reason to  _not_ , I mindlessly selected the «Hand Mirror» and equipped it.

I glanced over at Klein, who looked back with equal confusion in his eyes. Shrugging we both looked down at the small, rectangular mirror that was in our hands.

Woah… did my avatar… really look that masculine? Doing my best to ignore the painful feeling in my chest that sprouted at the realisation and stared contemplatively at my avatar's eyes.

And suddenly the world around me lit up, the sound of glass shattering surrounding me.

Once the light faded, and I could hear again, confused mutterings and murmurings spread across the plaza.

"Hey Kirito, what the Hell is—Who are you?"

I looked to my right, where Klein had been standing just a few seconds. The armour, hair, and curious bandana were all still there. But… the body shape, facial shape, eyes… everything else that made Klein who he had been physically wasn't there. The long, sharp eyes I'd noticed over the last several hours were sunken but brighter. His nose became slightly hooked, and the beginnings of a beard ran along his cheeks and chin.

…Good job Kyo—… Kazuto. First day in public SAO and you made friendly with a guy that would be a "maybe" when contemplating what a predator looked like.

Wait…

"Who is who—" I stopped suddenly. That's not the voice of my avatar. My avatar's voice was supposed to be a little lower pitched, older, more… masculine. This voice was…

Oh.

I glanced back down at the «Hand Mirror» for a second, just to confirm my suspicions. Yup. Short hair, slightly effeminate but still annoyingly male face, definitely not the appearance of an eighteen year-old man.

"Ki… Kirito?" Klein's voice came from the new man beside me. His voice had also changed, dropping in tone a little and becoming a little bit gruffer.

"…Yeah, it's me, Klein." That feeling in my chest abated a little at the sound of my voice, less smooth and significantly lighter. But a part of me, the part of me that wanted to be  _normal_ , cringed. I'd grown so used to the baritone, almost regal tone my avatar spoke in that hearing my voice felt… weird. Discomforting.

I glanced around quickly. Just a few seconds ago the plaza of the «Town of Beginnings» looked like your typical fantasy setting—abnormal hair colours, attractive heroes and heroines, lords and ladies and the like. But now…

Now it just looked like a LARPing scene. Everyone looked like regular Japanese young-adults. Even Klein, who's spiky hair used to be the same vibrant red as his bandana was now definitely brown, though with a slightly redder tint.

With another quick glance I noticed a lot of people in armour that… didn't quite fit their new bodies. Huh, crossplayers exist in «FullDive» too.

"How…" I heard Klein whisper next to me. "How is this possible? How did this happen?"

"Facial scanning from the vizor of the «NerveGear» and the calibration scan from initial setup." The answer came from my lips within an instant of Klein's question and I grimaced. Kyo— _Kazuto_ , you're not supposed to be doing that anymore!

"That… that explains the new height and erm… build disparities."

Klein's comment made me look around again. And sure enough, pretty much everyone in the plaza had shrunk a good ten to twenty centimetres. And similarly, the good ol' Japanese otaku stereotype reared its head for a… shocking minority of players.

NerveGear calibration was a simple if uncomfortable process. The user basically ran the sensor on the back of the NerveGear across their entire body. It would recognise everything down to an almost molecular level, somehow. It was all so the NerveGear could detect how much you'd need to move your hand to reach an area on your body in an attempt to reproduce the sense of kinetic accuracy within the game. As a result, practically every NerveGear owned had an almost perfect recreation of the user's body saved inside itself.

Because of the process it was, obviously, feasible to recreate the player's body in an exact, polygonal representation within any game that had access to the NerveGear's calibration data. However, there were limitations to the recreation process.

For one, the NerveGear depended on real life virtual databases to determine the sex of the player's model purely from the calibration data. So it looked at average estimates of body measurements of the sexes (both on and off hormonal therapies, if I remember mom and Argo telling me correctly) to build an estimate of the player's sex and then finally checked the sexual organs of the player, which is also a part of the regular calibration process, to finalise the model's sex.

No one quite knew what would happen if you  _skipped_  your sexual organs during the calibration, because the one-thousand beta testers that were able to test these facts weren't using the NerveGear generated player model, and obviously no one would be open about whether they scanned their genitalia to random strangers on the internet (especially because this data got stored onto online servers for reference between the Argus' «NerveGear Network»).

The NerveGear's calibration was part of what made it such a revolutionary piece of hardware. Because of it's kinetic accuracy recreation, the NerveGear's «Full Dive» was even more… realistic…

Oh of course.

"Reality…" I murmured, the purpose of this becoming clear to me. "He said this was to be reality now… so these polygon avatars… and… our HP was our real life… our real bodies…"

Oh Kayaba you…  _genius_  of a sociopath with a God complex.

"But… but  _why_  is he doing this?"

I gave Klein a slight glare. "Be quiet and listen, he'll probably explain soon." Frankly I thought that his reasons and motivations were pretty clear given the evidence we had at this time, but I was really not in the mood to explain it all to Klein.

Kayaba didn't let me down. A few seconds later his voice, sounding as regal as ever and almost… solemn, sounded from the sky.

『You will all most probably be wondering, "Why." Why am I—the creator of both the NerveGear and «Sword Art Online», Kayaba Akihiko, doing something like this?』

And it was here that Kayaba's voice, which had been almost emotionless up until now, seemed to show signs of emotion. The word… empathy came to mind—empathy and understanding—even though that couldn't possibly be true.

『The reason is simple… You, twenty-thousand individuals that were so desperate to escape the real world for this new, isolated virtual space—All of the unwanted, unneeded… you are now here. This world that you all wanted to adopt as reality eagerly, now have this as your primary and  _only_  reality. And I… I who desired to create this world, this world for all the displaced and disenfranchised and unwanted…  _This_  is why I created the «NerveGear» and «Sword Art Online». To watch over you all, as the one of you with the ambition and ability to fulfil all our desires. And this… This is why I no longer  _have_  a reason or purpose for doing this, as my reason and purpose have already been realised.』

Silence reigned for several seconds after the excited, impassioned… almost charismatic speech ended. And after a short break, Kayaba's once again emotionless voice spoke.

『Now… I have finished the official tutorial for «Sword Art Online». Players—I wish you luck.』

The last sentence trailed off with an echo as the huge robe rose soundlessly and started sinking, hood first, into the «System Message» that covered the sky.

The sound of wind blowing above the plaza and the BGM of the NPC musicians returned softly to our ears. The game had returned to normal.

But the Game… the game we all came to play had changed drastically. And at last, the crowd of twenty-thousand reacted beyond silent confusion.

"It's a joke, right? The Hell is this! It's a joke right!?"  
"Stop kidding around! Let me out! Let me out of here!"  
"No! You can't! I've got a date tonight!"  
"I don't like this! I want to go home! I want to see my fiancé!"

Yells. Clamours. Shouts. Curses. Begging. Screaming. All at once, all as loud and desperate as could be.

But in the midst of it all, in the confusion and anger and panic, my mind became cool again. The feeling in my chest settled, my panic began to recede, and I finally understood.

This… This  _is_  reality.

What Kayaba Akihiko had declared was…  _had_  to be true. It was the part of Kayaba that made him alluringly attractive—his genius and his blunt honesty. Which would mean…

…If we— _I_ —died here, my body would die in reality. The NerveGear, the most revolutionary and fascinating technological creation of the 21st century, had suddenly became a lock to a virtual prison as well as the helmet of the execution chair.

This was my new reality.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh no another new fic from me. And among that, a new SAO fic from me. I've been getting back into the franchise recently at the recommendation of my therapist (to just accept and enjoy the things I enjoy), and after reading Knowledgeseeker66's Kirita Chronicles prequel (The Kirita Chronicles - Story Arc One: What Happened Before) I remembered how much fun I had when writing Kuroi Kenshi like six years ago, and I decided to reboot it as a sort of... I dunno', I guess as a sort of fix-it for the Sword Art Online series—doing my best to make the characters and game feel more real to life, character progression more realistic for an MMO like SAO, give Kayaba an actual motivation for what he did to SAO, things like that.
> 
> Unlike Kuroi Kenshi this won't be a genderbender fic... per se. Kirito is a girl but... well. It's fairly obvious in the chapter what I mean. At the moment Kirito is the only person who's gender/sex I plan on changing in this fic, but we'll see how things play out.
> 
> I don't know if there'll be any sort of periodic updates but as things are right now I'm seriously hoping that how much I plan to change and have make sense in this fic will keep up my motivation to write it. So long as I don't find any sort of problems starting a chapter then I'll probably be working on it for as long as I can.
> 
> Anyway, I hope everyone liked this first chapter/introduction to my new story, The Black Blade, Reforged! I'll be getting back to work on the next chapter as soon as this one goes live, and should hopefully have it done, edited, and up by Monday!


	2. The First Day

« _Death Game_ »

I'd never really considered what made a death game a death game. Sure I'd been aware of the premise for several years now, and've read a few books that focused on the aspect of games that could end in death, but even in the period of technological advancement that hit in the mid-2010s thanks to Kayaba Akihiko and his co-workers at Argus I'd never considered the idea that someone could make a real honest to life game of death—so I'd never really considered it important to consider the definition of.

Sure, I've heard some people refer to death games as games involving bodily risk—but almost every sort of sport would be included under that definition. Martial arts, rock climbing, motor sports… even something simple like Laser Tag could involve bodily risk. No. The difference between these games and a death game is one, single condition.

Dying is the only punishment for loss.

Not as an accident, something unintended and tragic. No, death in a «Death Game» is just that. Intended. You lost, but instead of EXP or money or ranking, your punishment is your life—with no extras. The only, and final, consequence for a player's mistakes, defeat, or even just punishment for the violation of the rules.

Murder.

With the knowledge that «Sword Art Online», the world's first VRMMORPG, had indeed and unmistakably become a death game, the entire feeling of the game had… changed. It was no longer the exploration of a fantasy world without magic, where physical combat reigned supreme with reaching the top of the «Floating Castle of Aincrad» being the only goal of the player.

No. With the personal declaration of the game's developer, and as such our  _«God»_ , Kayaba Akihiko had made clear that in «Sword Art Online»—once your HP reaches zero (your defeat), you will be killed. If your «NerveGear» were to be removed, tampered with, or cut off from a permanent power source for more than an hour and a half—about half an hour under the estimated extent of the NerveGear's internal battery's charge life—hence, a breaking of the rules, you will also be killed.

And the only way out was to clear all one-hundred floors.

It… Even  _knowing_  for a fact that everything Kayaba said was the truth, it just didn't feel  _real_. I of course had no personal evidence that any of his statements were true, just news headlines and news reports that a genius like Kayaba Akihiko could easily have fabricated even just a few hours prior.

And not only that, but… I had nowhere near the technological genius that the development team in Argus' entertainment division had, but when I'd opened my NerveGear upon getting it to take a peek at the internals, I don't remember seeing anything that could  _kill_  a person from the internals. Not without direct touch of the internal power supply at least. And among that, aren't consumer products like the NerveGear supposed to have a maximum amount of microwaves that can be emitted that rest well below a harmful level? How could the NerveGear,  _a game machine fit for households_ , make it onto the shelves in the way it did?

And even beyond that… for as clear as Kayaba's motivations and intentions had been, they made  _no sense_  to me? If he were a criminal holding us, Japan's next generation and much of its work force, hostage in some attempt to destabilise the country's infrastructure or even for something as simple as the ransom for  _twenty-thousand people_ , I'd be able to make  _some_  sense of it. But… Kayaba Akihiko, the most in demand technician and quantum physicist made over ￥100,000,000 a year, there's no way he'd need ransom money—And we, the players trapped in this game, were the early adopters of his groundbreaking technology, attempting to remove us to destabilise his very source of income and passion made absolutely no sense.

Even looking at it from the perspective he'd tried to portray to us in the plaza, from the perspective and idea of a «Saviour of Japan's Youth and Workers», it made no sense. We wouldn't,  _didn't_ , view him as any sort of  _saviour_ —only as one of the worst criminals in human history, removing any sort of reputation he had as a game designer and scientist.

Even I, a g—boy,  _boy_ —who's dream was to live in a virtual reality where I was  _something_ , viewed what Kayaba did—is  _doing_ —to be among the greatest crimes Japan has ever experienced since our fall as an imperialist empire.

But… even if logically I couldn't understand or quell my suspicions, I understood on an instinctual level. The Stage that is the «Floating Castle of Aincrad» has changed from a virtual world overflowing with passion, excitement, and promises of fulfilled dreams, into a cage of death trapping twenty-thousand people within it.

And it was because of this knowledge that I, the level-one swordsman Kirito, am running with my life at stake.

…Alone. In the vast grasslands of the «First Floor» after abandoning the first friend I'd made in this world.

The mere thought of Klein made my eyes sting and my chest get that  _ache_  again.

And all of this… everything I've done, everything I  _plan_  to do—is to keep myself alive.

"…Selfishness… phe, I'm the very image of a solo player…"

As I ran, that was the first thing I whispered. For as much as I meant to say it humorously, I knew that everything else—my fear, my bitterness, self-hatred really—had bubbled to the surface. If only that cutlass use were here, if only my first reaction to situations like this were to run away and abandon everyone that could help me.

I tell myself I only want him here with me to remove some of my guilt, but… no. I knew that I'd deserted what could have been my only friends in this world at the «Town of Beginnings». Even after he'd offered to come with me, as long as the rest of his friends that he was  _of course_  worried about— _you selfish idi_ —could come with us as well, I knew I'd just abandoned him.

You could argue I didn't suggest they come with too because I was trying to keep them safe, of course. The forests of the «First Floor» were home to some pretty dangerous creatures, especially for level-one players. Poisonous bees, predatory plants like the «Little Nepenthes»… if even just a single wrong move was made, if someone's reaction was delayed just a little bit… with one of the special attacks, or a crit—it would mean their deaths. So obviously I was just trying to keep them safe!

But… no. It wasn't their lives I was trying to protect, it was mine. I  _know_  that if one of them were to have died on my watch, that look Klein would give me, would be one of the biggest stabs to my heart. I didn't want to have those worries, didn't want to be hurt. And it was because of fear for my own life that I left, abandoned the one who called out to me and who invited me to play as a party for  _the first time_  in this world.

Emotions of disgust swelled up inside, unable to be abated by my false self-righteousness or torturous monologue.

I watched as, a little ahead of me, a «Frenzy Boar» spawned in the bushes. Most of the monsters in the plains of the «First Floor» were passive, aggroing only when attacked or 'threatened' by NPCs or player-characters and were only level-one mobs so the EXP gain from even killing entire hordes of them was  _very_  minimal—not even worthwhile mobs to grind even for players level-one themselves. Because of this I'd planned to ignore them for the most part, only attacking ones that got in my way as I made my way towards «Horunka». But out of impulse my right-hand wrapped around the hilt of my blade and readied the motion for the single hit sword skill, «Slant».

Reacting to being targeted, the «Frenzy Boar» glared at me and violently tore at the ground—the motion for a charge.

The blade of my sword faintly glowed blue, and along with a sound effect, my body moved. «Sword Art Online», to make up for being a «Full Dive» MMO marketed towards consumers that most like didn't know how to effectively and  _efficiently_  attack with any sort of weapon, had a function known as the system assist for weapon skills. The assist took control of your virtual body after the initiation of a weapon skill and corrected everything, from your stance to your movement to even the momentum of your swing or throw, so long as you didn't fight against the movement. A player could also increase the power of the skill by consciously learning all the corrections the system assist made—something I'd spent several days in the beta doing for several of the lower level «Sword Skills».

The base stats at level-one, along with the specs of any and all equipment that could be obtained in the «Town of Beginnings» prior to more floors being opened, were obviously extremely weak. But even then, if a boosted «Sword Skill»-even a «Slant»—were to score a critical hit at the weak point of a «Frenzy Boar», the damage output would be enough to OHK the monster.

And as the slash I'd released head-on struck the mane area of the boar, the beast was sent flying violently backwards.

"Giiiiiii!"

Screaming as it bounced, it stopped in the air and with a *bashaaa*, the boar started to fragment into thousands of polygons and in an intense blue light, exploded.

Sheathing the blade into the scabbard on my back with a dramatic flourish, I continued on my way through the light without even bothering to glance at the EXP gain or the material items. Eight EXP, one «Hide of a Frenzied Boar» and two «Boar Tusks» were barely worth even a glance away from the dark forest I'd  _finally_  started to near as I sped down the path as fast as my AGI allowed.

Taking care to avoid the «Reaction Radius» of the monsters that plagued the forests of the «First Floor» I ran towards my destination, «Horunka», just before sunset.

I quickly surveyed the tiny village from its entrance, paying close attention to the coloured cursers above each actor's head. All of them were tagged as an NPC—meaning I'd been the first player to arrive at the village. Though that  _was_  to be expected after all, I'd dashed at full speed with barely any conversation as soon as the 'tutorial' ended.

So with that minor feeling of smug satisfaction that could only come with being the first player to arrive at a new village, I made my way towards the weapon shop. First order of business was to sell the excess pelts, tusks, and «Caterpillars' Silk» in my storage to the shopkeeper NPC and use the Col to buy a leather half-coat with decently high defence for level-one—+6pts armour—that fit my now actual body than what I had on under it.

I'd touched the instant equip button when I'd purchased it, and I watched in the mirror as the leather piece came into being over my white shirt and grey vest. But…

Turning to the mirror to focus on my appearance better, my breath hitched. The actor reflected by the surface was certainly a far-cry from the «Kirito» I spent almost an hour in the beta creating. But…

…That jacket wasn't the male's texture  _or_  mesh.

The jacket I remember from the beta, on «Kirito's» body was slightly shorter than the one appearing on  _my_  body—hanging only down to the middle of my thighs rather than my knees like the one in the mirror and nowhere as slim.

The rest of my body was familiar to me—slightly more slender than my real body, but other than that it was just as thin, a face just as soft as the one in reality, short and slightly rounded black hair… My eyes, too, were my own—slightly lighter than my hair, close to a slate grey. And appearance  _just_  like mine in reality, reproduced with a… frightening level of detail—

But why… why was my jacket the texture for a female character model? The rest of my starting gear was the same as when I was «Kirito», resized to fit my shorter body and limbs. Though looker closer, the shirt  _did_  look cut a little different, and the pants…

…Oh Argo is going to love this.

Just staring at the avatar in the mirror now, mentally replacing the gear I had with the solid metal plate armour I'd been planning to wear as «Kirito» sent a sense of revulsion and disgust through my very self. «Kirito», fantasy hero of Aincrad and the rugged anime swordsmen wore plate armour with a sword and shield, preferring to focus on STR and DEF. But Kirigaya K… Kazuto, the me now in Aincrad, preferred rough and lean leathers with a single one-handed sword and maybe an off-hand dagger or a small, round shield for blocking or parrying and focused on STR and AGI.

Thankfully in SAO, speed-type one-handed sword users could get really solid armour ratings from leather armours. We couldn't become tanks, of course—but the aforementioned type of players tended to be solo players, and there was no need for a tank build with a solo player. Tanks always relied on other forces, high DPS and range builds, to do most of the damage to the mobs tanks attracted to themselves and for a solo player, doing such a thing would mean failure.

Normally, and I'm expecting this what the average new player will do once they reach «Horunka», I'd replace my «Small Sword» with a new basic shortsword from the weapon shop. Even on the first floor a player could buy a decent «Bronze Sword», which had higher durability than the «Small Sword» and did more damage. However one of the reasons I ran to «Horunka» as quickly as I could was because…

"Please, wanderer, I need your help!"

…An even better sword could be obtained from one of the NPC quests in the village.

As I walked out of the weapon shop an NPC that looked like a perfect «Village Missus» came running up to me, body frail and cheeks hollowed.

"What do you need of me, madam?" I gave the intended response, enunciating clearly so that the system would be able to process my words accurately. As much of a breakthrough the «NerveGear» may be, there were still only so many phrases a team of developers could program NPCs to react to when giving quests, and even the «NerveGear» couldn't translate the vast variations of "how can I help you?" that every player would give.

"Please, my daughter has been stricken with a terrible illness! I have tried every medicine that can be obtained in the village, but nothing effects it!"

And the "doctor of the village" 'let slip' that perhaps the medicine provided by the ovules of the «Little Nepenthes» could cure her illness, but the mother and no one in the village could brave the forests of the village without risking heavy losses.

«The Secret Medicine of the Forest» is one of the first quests a player could get, having no prerequisites, and it could be done by any player at any time so long as it's done before the first floor was cleared. And the reward—

"Please! I have no money with which to repay your favour, but I could give you my former husband's sword in return!"

—the «Anneal Blade», arguably the best early game sword and one that could last as a main weapon until probably the «Third Floor».

As she told me the 'story', the woman led me to her house and by the time the quest would be granted to me we'd reached her house on the border of the village, one of the larger spawn zones for the «Little Nepenthes» being just a mile or so behind her home. And even from the outside, the dry and haggard coughs of the NPC's daughter could be clearly heard.

I wasn't expecting the stab in my heart.

Logically, intellectually, I knew that the daughter wasn't real. An actorless sound effect. But the entire situation… a worried and tearful mother and her daughter that, no matter what she did, couldn't be helped.

It… it made me think of my mom and sister. And it made me think— _Sorry for the trouble I've caused mom. I should've listened to Sugu and stayed away from the games, tried to work better at getting past my phobias and learning how to interact with other people_.

Over the last several years I'd found myself growing further and further apart from my mom and little sister—I'd never been very close to my dad—, and I couldn't bring myself to try to get myself closer to either of them. My little sister and I pretty much only interacted with each other when we cooked since my first breakdown at school, and my mom and I…

I had to turn and walk into the forests before I fell to tears, had to do  _something_  to break my train of thought, had to find something to focus on.

I  _had_  to get out of this game. Had to help clear all one-hundred floors, get back into actual reality, get back to my mom and little sister. And to do that, I needed to become strong—become something vastly different from the Me of reality, a weak computer nerd that dropped kendo because of too high expectations and disappointed abuse.

I had to become strong—at the very least, on this floor for now. Strong enough to be able to withstand and survive whatever numbers are thrown at me… maybe even strong enough to defend myself against PKers, if any of the 20,000 players in this game could handle the thought of truly ending a human life.

And maybe… when, if, I live to escape this… this  _Hell_  of a prison called a «game», I'll apologise to my mom and sister, go see a therapist and get prescribed medications.

Deciding so mournfully, I continued on my trek into the forest covered in the setting sun's ominous light.

The «Floating Castle of Aincrad» technically doesn't have direct light for most of its floors—as a replacement, the bottom of the next floor (a constant 100 metres above the ground of the current floor) is programmed to reflect the sky above Japan on any given day. At night, however, instead of the fake moon lighting up the night the gamma levels are automatically adjusted to make everything look like there's been a slightly blue filter layered over your vision, lighting the environment up enough that even when running through the forest in the pitch black of night, everything was visible enough to pose no inconvenience.

But… even with that, the fear and anxiety that something could be right behind me would rise every so often. It was only at times like this, with the knowledge that I'd die or (normally) lose a lot of progress and loot, that I missed the sense of security that came from playing in a party. But there was no point thinking about that—there was no going back.

_Klein and his friends are probably at one of the taverns or inns by now anyway, drinking away their fear and anxiety._

Thanking my forethought to choose «Searching» as one of my starting skills, I slowed my movement down to a fast stroll, keeping to the shadows as best as possible while looking out for cursers—the red of a monster and the green of a player both.

In «Sword Art Online», every player starts off with two skill slots—meant to be allocated to a weapon skill like I'd done with «One-handed Sword» and one extra that could either be applied to a trade like smithing, mercantile, cooking, etc. if you didn't intend to fight in the frontlines, or for skills like armour proficiencies, secondary weapon skills, or skills like «Hiding» and «Searching»—the latter being the second skill I'd allocated a slot to.

And despite the knowledge that perhaps pre-deciding that I'd be going the path of a solo player would be something I'd regret eventually, at the moment… The sight of a magenta curser could only make me bless choosing «Searching».

The colour of a monster's curser denoted their relative strength—ranging from a nearly white pink for mobs that dropped so little EXP it may as well be zero, to a red more intense than blood for monsters that you had no hope in killing unless you really wanted to spend half an hour to an hour dodging, removing any of the enjoyment that came from «Sword Art Online's» combat.

The magenta curser indicated a monster that was a little bit above the player's current level—the «Little Nepenthe», a level-three mob that was basically a metre and a half tall plant and the highest level creature this close to the «City of Beginnings», would be a greater danger to me than most of the other creatures I'd fought today, but only based purely off level and not actual stats or threat level.

And while it was certainly not an opponent to be made light of, I had no reason to fear. I'd fought a  _lot_  of «Little Nepenthes» and even their stronger cousins, the «Nepenthes» closer to «Tolbana»—the second largest settlement on the first floor—, so I knew their attack animations almost by heart and knew how to dodge them and with my knowledge of how to exploit the game's «Sword Skill» system and my actual knowledge on how to fight with a blade, I knew there'd be almost no actual danger. So long as I was smart.

I stopped walking and, with a cautious scan of the area to make sure no other mob types were present nearby, I turned in the direction of the Little Nepenthe and dashed in head-on. Despite the fact that sneak attacks usually gave 3x bonus damage (even more with critical strikes) without any points put into DEX or the «Hiding» and «Dagger» skills, they tended to be… less than rarely effective against mobs that saw through scent and not sight, like the Little Nepenthe.

Stepping off the small path, I circled around a grand tree and the monster's form became visible. It's lower body was a mass of writhing roots which it used to move and attached to the giant bulb that was its body, near the mouth, were two vines with sharpened leaves meant for attacking.

No flower, the quest item needed for «The Secret Medicine of the Forest»-the «Little Nepenthe's Ovule». Technically one could get an ovule from a regular Little Nepenthe, but the drop rate off a regular one was probably 0.01%, with the spawn rate of a Little Nepenthe guaranteed to drop the ovule starting at 0.65%.

However, the spawn rate of the rarer Little Nepenthes increased as a player killed more and more of the monsters under the Nepenthe family of mobs. Not significantly, maybe by 0.002% per Nepenthe killed, but it was still an increasing spawn rate and the zone behind the quest giver's home was a large spawn zone for Little Nepenthes.

Like most monsters this close to the starting city, the Little Nepenthe had very few actual attacks and a fairly simple attack pattern. They'd slash and stab with the point of its ivy, and spit corrosive fluid from their mouths, and both attacks had very visible and easy tells. While definitely more complex a monster than the «Frenzied Boars» or the «Silken Web Caterpillars», none of the mobs in the Nepenthe family could use «Sword Skills» and their attacks were slow, so they were nowhere near the risk the humanoid mobs were.

The lack of defensive options and little to no battle intelligence made these kinds of mobs incredibly easy to take hordes of on alone and within very little time, even in the beta.

I drew my sword with a grin and jumped to the left just as the Little Nepenthe thrust its right vine towards me. Turning in the air towards its side at the same time, I drove my sword into the thin stalk connecting its root legs and bulbous body—the Little Nepenthe's only weak point.

Its health dropped by almost 30%.

Letting out a howl of anger, the plant inflated its body—the tell for its spitting fluid. A front cone attack of about 30 degrees and five metres that causes HP damage, durability damage, and debuffs a player's movement speed. The attack was a more difficult one to dodge—impossible to dodge by jumping backwards and required timing with a forgiveness of maybe half a second to evade by dodging to the side. A player could learn the timing of the attack based off visual cues they could fine tune their dodging by listening for visual cues, but a new player wouldn't know either of these cues, so this corrosive fluid attack will probably be one of the most frequent end of new players in this «Death Game».

But a someone like me, who fought probably several hundreds of Little Nepenthes solo in the beta test, could easily dodge at just the right moment to evade the attack.

Waiting for the final animation before the launch of the attack, the instant the expansion of its body decreased, I jumped with all my might to the right. A pale green fluid shot out in a spray to my left almost immediately, forming a vapour as it fell onto the ground. The instant I landed I brought my sword back up and, with a hard stab to the same weak point, the Little Nepenthe's bulb bent backwards as its outline glowed a faint yellow. Stunned.

With less than 50% of its HP left, and not willing to let this chance slip, I pulled my sword to my right—the starting motion and stance for the single-hit sword skill «Horizontal». Not even giving the system assist time to charge the sword skill I slashed my «Small Sword», the sword skill status remaining in the motion, and pushed my feet into a hop to the left. With the boosted sword skill damage, my blade sliced through the tough stalk, only facing a little bit of resistance. And with a groan, the Little Nepenthe shattered into thousands of polygons with the sound of breaking glass.

The instant I landed I pulled my sword back a little, cancelling the «Sword Skill» status. Forty seconds and sixteen EXP, double how much EXP a «Frenzied Boar» dropped. It took four-hundred EXP to level up to level two, nine-hundred from level two to level three, 1,400 from level three to get to level four…

72EXP from farming with Klein earlier, so with that already 88EXP put towards level two… I should be able to make this at least somewhat efficient, as efficient as grinding mobs is in «Sword Art Online».

With the sword in my right hand lowered, I surveyed my surroundings. Several cursers for the Little Nepenthe appeared, yet unseen by players.

I'd need to hurry, I knew. With 1,000 beta testers, at least some of which being players that would ally themselves with parties like I could have with Klein, I'd need to level up as much as I could before parties of players were led to Horunka for this very quest. But the amount of Little Nepenthes I'd need to kill… it could exhaust the spawn of the area. Even just getting to level four would require me to kill over 120 Little Nepenthes. The arrogance to make me think that I could do such a thing in one night, let alone before more players arrived…

Having settled on my next prey, I dashed into the forest once more.

Fifteen minutes later, over ten Little Nepenthes had been killed and I was over half-way to level two. Sadly, no ovule yet. Unfortunate, because the «Anneal Blade» would speed this up dramatically, especially so with the «continuous sword skill» glitch that seems to not have been reported or patched in the months since the beta test.

Sword Art Online's drop system worked on pure RNG, with no «Luck» stat to modify drop rates or crit chances. And, while incredibly irritating, there were definitely players from the beta test that you could see in streams or on forums boasting about their actual luck—about how they'd gotten items with drop rates even less than 0.0001% one after the other, or having succeeded in refining their equipment ten times in a row (item refinement is a generous 10% chance of succession), or even just managing to interact with other people and get along. And because of Sword Art Online's lack of a LUC stat to increase or buff, the only way you could compete with them was to repeat those attempts over and over and over and over again.

The sound a monster spawning in grabbed my attention and, noticing more enemy cursers, I rushed back into the fray. A few minutes later and eight more Little Nepenthes killed, the level up fanfare I'd been well acquainted with from the beta rang out in my hearing and a golden light effect surrounded my body.

I'd finally exceeded the amount of EXP needed to level up.

If I were in a party there'd likely be claps and calls of 'congrats' from my party members in that instant. But instead, as the virtual wind rustled the treetops, I sheathed my sword back into its scabbard. Drawing my index and middle fingers together I swiped down, opening the menu, and navigated my way to the status tab. Level one to level two gave the player three SP which could be allocated to their STR (a prerequisite for many weapons and the general damage modifier for most physical weapons and weapon skills damage), VIT (your defence and health modifier), INT (the modifier for trade skills and the speed in which system assist would ready your weapon skills), DEX (the modifier for «Hiding» and damage modifier for daggers, bows, and sneak attacks as well as the «Throwing Blades» skill), and AGI (the modifier for speed and system assisted reflexes) stats.

Having already predetermined what sort of build I'd be rolling while in Horunka, I dropped two points into AGI and one point into STR without even a second thought. As much as VIT could be helpful in this new death game and INT would help me level up any bonus trade skills I decide to grab (I knew I was going to grab cooking at level four, the next level where I'd unlock a skill slot.

Finishing stat allocation, I closed the menu, and behind me…

A stiff clapping sound rang out.

I jumped back and spun around in the air, placing my hand around my sword's hilt. That was my first mistake since Kayaba's announcement, getting too absorbed in operating the menu while outside of a «Safe Zone» and letting my guard down was something not even a beginner would do, a mistake so amateurish my entire core filled with shame and self-hatred, and the phantom feeling of sharp slaps of bamboo flared up across my whole body.

Berating myself as I prepared for battle, I didn't see a monster. I scolded myself thinking I'd be seeing another monster, knowing that there were no creatures that spawned in this forest that could clap like that.

It was another person. But not an NPC, the curser above their head indicated them to be another player. I let a player sneak up behind me.

A boy slightly taller than myself, around the same age if not a little older. He wore the light armour and buckler sold at Horunka and strapped across his back was the same Small Sword from the initial equipment. But it wasn't drawn. He was leaning a little stiffly against one of the trees, his mouth slightly agape.

He was clapping. Applause from this other player for my level up.

I took a short breath, calming my nerves and grounding myself in my current reality, and lowered my hand. The boy's lips closed and curved into a sort of stiff, awkward smile, and his head bowed for a moment.

"S-Sorry for startling you like that. I should have called out from the start."

His voice was soft and smooth, a little nice to the ears to be honest, and the embarrassment for my reaction resulted in a faint blush. Yeah, the embarrassment. Nothing else.

After a few seconds, I spoke as the boy started to fidget a little.

"…No, me too… sorry for the overreaction." I stuffed my hands into the pockets of my half coat.

The boy, who's posture relaxed a little, widened his cute faltering smile, and made some… some sort of movement with his right hand, bringing his index and middle fingers up near his eyes.

Yup… glasses wearer, definitely.

"Congrats on your level up. That was pretty quick."

'Quick' as in without finishing any quests leading up to it. Sword Art Online's level and character progression leaned very heavily towards quest clearing, Floor Labyrinth raiding, and dungeon crawling. Mob grinding, especially on the lower floors, was incredibly inefficient from the perspective of a regular game.

I lowered my head towards the boy's words, shifting slightly away from him. It felt… off, weird… unexpected, as if he'd known my thoughts of 'if I were in a party'. My head shook from side to side in a fluster.

"T-Thanks… A-And if you're saying that, you're fast too. I thought it would be a few more hours before anyone else reached this forest."

He laughed awkwardly. "I thought I'd be the first to arrive, honestly. The path to get here isn't as straight forward as the path to «Medai» or «Tolbana» from the starting city."

… _He's… the same as me…_

Another beta tester. Another  _solo_  beta tester.

"You're doing it to, right? The «Secret Medicine of the Forest»?"

He grinned when I nodded, moving to shift his non-existent glasses agin.

"That's an indispensable quest for us one-handed sword users, after all. When you get the «Anneal Blade» reward, it's good all the way till the Third Floor's labyrinth."

"…With a bit of grinding, a player that knows how to roll a smith can make and upgrade a basic iron blade with a little bit better damage than it, but… lower durability… Not to mention the appearance isn't much to talk about."

As I added that, he let out a bright laugh and nodded his head. After a short pause, his stance shifted again and… the words weren't what I was expecting.

"Two beta testers doing the same quest while the rest of the game is probably holed up in the «City of Beginnings» wetting their pants… this is a rare occurrence. Why not work together on the quest."

"…Party up and double grind to increase the spawn for a chance at two ovules?"

Partying up in Sword Art Online was only a little more generous than in most MMOs. Instead of splitting the amount of EXP gained from basic mobs, it only halved the EXP of area and floor bosses as well as quests and dungeon crawls. The spawn rate of mobs increased exponentially with party members and mobs with increase spawn chance rates had cumulative increases, so with each Little Nepenthe killed we'd increase the spawn chance for the rare Nepenthes by 0.004% instead of just 0.002%.

Though that benefit was deemed negligible for this quest, as the «Secret Medicine of the Forest» quest required each person in the party hoping to clear the quest to have an ovule of their own. In the beta, before we cleared the first floor, it was common for testers to party up in groups of five and raise the rate at which the spawn chance increased by a little under four times, to 0.0074%, to raise the spawn chance of the «Blooming Little Nepenthe» to over 1% in only a few minutes and then, after the players that wanted another Anneal Blade had the ovules they needed, dissolving the party.

…We really needed the Anneal Blade for that ridiculous grinding. There's a reason we only cleared four floors in two months.

"Well, yeah, actually."

His assent caused my avatar to harshly stiffen. Was I really going to agree to party with another beta tester after abandoning Klein, the first friend I'd ever actually made, just only an hour or so ago?

…I really need to stop thinking of it like that.

Before giving the boy the chance to read my hesitation wrong, I reopened the menu to send him an invite, but…

No.

For a moment I'd forgotten that item drops for parties didn't go into anybody's individual inventory, but a temporary joint one where a player would then transfer it to their inventory. Meaning he could snatch the ovule once we got one, dissolve the party, and then leave me to the increased spawn rates alone.

He noticed my next bout of hesitance and grinned sheepishly.

"Ah, the worry that I'd steal the ovule… I'd say 'you don't need to worry about that', but… well, we both know you wouldn't believe me. I certainly wouldn't."

I wanted to believe him, desperately wanted to. Making a party with another person, putting faith and trust in someone else like me, would mean a lot. Would be a step towards healing and self-improvement, but…

"Ah… aah, that's… yeah, then, excuse me, but…"

He laughed amusedly and smiled brightly, another round of embarrassed blushing lit up on my face.

"No, it's fine, I understand. If we continue hunting at boosted rates an ovule should definitely drop soon, so if we stick together until then, I'll let you have the first one."

I nodded stiffly, getting the boy to step up and offer his right hand.

"That's good to hear, thanks. So I guess I'll be in your care for the time being, I'm «Coper»."

The name didn't ring a bell, but that didn't mean much. It was entirely possible that he'd used a different name in the beta, or wasn't giving me his real name so I couldn't recall him to a KSer or known major PKer from the beta. Similarly I could give him a fake name, but «Kirito» wasn't widely known in the beta I don't think. I was a little bit of a griefer, but not a known one like the Prince of Hell (an infamous griefer and PKer from the beta, who I hope would have the heart to not PK anyone in this death game).

I mirrored his action, extending my own hand and grasping his in a handshake. "Kirito."

His brow arched.  _Did_  he know my name? Had he known «Kirito» from the beta and had some sort of bad opinion on me—

"Not the name I was expecting from a girl like yourself."

—Ignoring the feeling that rose in my core, one not as uncomfortable as the previous ones, I shook my head sharply. "Boy."

His eyes scanned down my body, undoubtedly noting the half coat that was definitely the texture for a female actor and the different cut shirt. He hummed noncommittally.

"Come on, let's get hunting. We have to get two ovules before anyone else gets here."

"Y-Yeah, that's right. Let's go for it!"

Satisfied I'd ended the conversation and hopefully interrupted whatever line of thinking he'd been one, we nodded to each other and dashed towards a nearby group of Little Nepenthes.

As expected of a beta tester, Coper's game sense was nothing to scoff at. His actions and reactions closely mirrored my own, dodging at the right times and watching and listening for the same cues to tell when to dodge and when it was alright to attack. In my opinion he focused a little too heavily on defence for monsters like this, but given the situation, it was understandable.

Neither of us trusted each other enough to let our guards down or get lost in the feeling of battle.

After an hour, wherein Coper levelled up to level two and I'd reached level three, we'd started to relax and settle into a routine with good synergy. Coper would lure our target, I'd strike at its weak point with a «continuous sword skill» combo, and then we'd switch.

We'd even gone out of our way to evade striking the fruit on the other special kind of Little Nepenthe, the «Aromatic Little Nepenthe», to instil some sense of trust worthiness in the opposite party.

The fruit of the Aromatic Little Nepenthe would, if struck directly and popped, would drastically increase the spawn rate and greatly increase the detection zone of all Nepenthe type monsters in the area. It had the same spawn rate as the Blooming Little Nepenthe, but clearly Coper and I were equally unlucky because we'd gotten several Aromatic Little Nepenthes while still no Blooming Nepenthe had spawned.

Even with 150 Little Nepenthes killed between us, seventy-five each. Even with my now 0.84% spawn chance for the Blooming Little Nepenthe and his 0.80% spawn chance.

We slowly came to a stop, breathing heavily from our hunt. Coper sighed tiredly.

"It's… still not out."

"It… it could be the spawn chance rate has changed since the beta…? It certainly wouldn't be the first time I've heard of MMO developers lowering rates after official online launches."

'And it would make sense, considering the circumstances' went unsaid. Trusting Coper to watch my back for a few seconds, I popped my menu back open and dropped three of my SP into AGI, one into STR, and one into INT.

"…That's true…" he spoke as I closed my menu. "So… what now? We've both levelled up, and I'm half way to level three… the durability of our «Small Swords» have undoubtedly dropped quite a bit, maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea to go back to town and…"

Coper stopped, staring ahead. Following his line of sight, my breathing skipped. Not even ten metres away from us, faint outlines of a mobs appeared under a tree. More Little Nepenthe, obviously. But… there was a major and noticeable difference on one of them.

At the top of its bulb body, sat a glistening toxic red flower.

A «Blooming Little Nepenthe» and finally spawned.

We sat watching for several seconds, making sure we weren't just seeing things, before turning to each other.

With a muted ware cry, we charged. Swinging our individual swords forth, we swung and slash and stabbed with a vigour we'd not had for almost twenty minutes, and—

I slashed my sword across the stalk of the Blooming Nepenthe with my sword. As a special monster its defence and attack was slightly higher than a regular Little Nepenthe, but with my allocations into STR and my raising my «One-handed Sword» skill to 8/1000 the deviation meant almost nothing to me.

Even with my doubts and worries, the accumulated experience of battles from the beta test, the last hour and a half of hunting, and the instincts that Man beat into myself and my sister, evading the attacks of the Nepenthe's vines were almost second nature and muscle memory.

Its HP dropped into the yellow within just a couple slashes. Leaping backwards, I readied my sword for a «Horizontal» sword skill for one more hit to kill it. With a cry I lunged forward, using my momentum to boost the damage of the sword skill and interrupting the Nepenthe's spitting attack before it had a chance to ready half way.

The body fell away from the roots with a loud shriek.

The flower at the top of its body fell to the ground delicately as the bulb shattered into thousands of polygons. In the light of the death animation, a fist-sized ball tumbled to the ground, rolling to my boots.

I bent over and picked it up, ignoring the rest of the fight around me and the rest of the Blooming Little Nepenthe's body exploding.

My second mistake of the night.

As I grabbed the «Little Nepenthe's Ovule» and added it to my inventory, a loud  _POP_  rang through the clearing of the forest. My head lifted up…

…Coper's left hand was outstretched, his face calm and his eyes… sorrowful, and slightly hungry. Following the path of his arm, my eyes turned to probably the most horrifying sight of the night.

An Aromatic Little Nepenthe, one I hadn't noticed before now… with a popped seed.

_He…_

A loud shriek rang through the clearing, and with my slightly increased INT and «Searching» skill, more red cursers popped up in the darkness of the forest as a sweet scent filled the forest.

_He's trying to…_

Turning my gaze back to Coper, my body beginning to shake in fear and anger, the handsome boy mouthed a 'sorry' and ducked into the darkness of the clearing, activating a clearly higher levelled «Hiding» skill than my «Searching» skill.

_He's trying to_ _ **kill** _ _me!_

Both trying to kill me and hide himself from the horde of Nepenthes that would undoubtedly end my life not even a full five hours into the official launch of «Sword Art Online». But…

… _He doesn't know._

«Hiding» didn't effect Little Nepenthes—not until around skill level 150/1000, where even the scent of a player would be hidden. They functioned off smell—a smell that would  _still_  be there.

I could tell him, warn him, save his life at the sacrifice of my own. That'd be the right thing to do, the selfless and heroic thing to do. My life didn't mean anything—just a depressed, socially anxious, autistic outcast that could barely speak more than eight words to strangers in reality and had panic attacks in large groups of real people and could only function slightly better in virtual reality. My mom's life would probably be better without having to worry so much about me, and my little sister would have one less headache.

…But I'm not selfless. I'm not a hero. I'm selfish, I didn't want to die—To me my life meant more than Coper's ever could. I wanted to live—to fix myself, to defeat all my insecurities and turn my negatives into positives. To show my mom that she doesn't have to always worry about me, to make up with Sugu and give her back her older si—older brother.

_Wanted to fix myself and be the boy that I was supposed to be, not this broken girl that shouldn't exist._

So as the first wave of Little Nepenthes stepped into the clearing, I dashed. Dashed as fast as my AGI would let me—past Coper, through the trees, though the twists and turns of the forest. Dashed at full speed for several kilometres, ignoring as Coper's panicked and begging screams pierced the air. Dashed all the way back to «Horunka», ignoring the tears and sorrow that filled me.

It was 9:00PM by the time I got back to Horunka, and as I should have expected, several player cursers were spread through the village. Probably all beta testers, as the almost 19,000 regular players would probably be too scared or too anxious to push anywhere past the «Town of Beginnings» until big enough parties had been formed to act as clearers. Large gaps in level and equipment would undoubtedly follow suit between beta tester and regular player, but… as a selfish beta tester myself, I had no right to worry about that kind of thing.

I slid into the shadows and, walking through alleyways to avoid any player noticing me, made my way towards the hut belonging to the «Village Missus» and her sick daughter. Waiting for the NPC to go inside, meaning that she was not going to assign the quest to someone else just yet, I slide out of a nearby alley and stepped into the hut.

Stepping up to the missus, who was leaning over a large steaming cauldron that was supposed to be filled with coloured liquid that indicated the medicines she bought from the town market, I cleared my throat to get her attention. Making sure that she had a large exclamation point over her head, indicating I was able to finish the quest, I opened my inventory and hit the «turn into item» option for the ovule and reached out to hand it over to her.

Her face instantly lit up but, instead of taking the ovule from my hands, she walked over to the door leading to what was alluded to be the room housing the sick girl the medicine was supposed to be for, babbling words of gratitude.

…This… isn't how the quest went in the beta.

Slightly worried, I glanced to the quest log at the top right of my vision.

_~~\- Obtain the «Little Nepenthe's Ovule» from the «Blooming Little Nepenthe»~~ _

_~~\- Return to the «Begging Mother» in «Horunka Village»~~ _

_\- Crush the «Little Nepenthe's Ovule»_

_\- Add the «Nepenthine Powder» into the medicine_

_\- Scoop the «Nepenthine Elixer» into a vial for the «Sick Daughter»_

_\- Give the «Sick Daughter» the «Nepenthine Elixer»_

This is… this is  _very_  different from the beta. Shrugging my shoulders I walked up to the table and ground the ovule into a fine powder, scooped the powder into the cauldron and stirred before the third quest step was crossed out.

Grabbing the vial near the cauldron I scooped the medicine into it. Wanting to just… get this over with, I spun towards the room and walked into it with the medicine.

My heart stopped.

A little girl, about the age of six or seven, was sitting up in a bed, supported by her mother's hands. She coughed haggardly, her entire body turning in on itself and shaking in pain—the mother looked at me with a desperate expression.

I walked forward stiffly.

Shakily handing the little NPC girl the medicine, she turned to me and… smiled. Smiled so bright it looked like it had to hurt, but… looked like it belonged on her face.

Like it belonged on Sugu's face.

"Thank you big sister—" She grabbed the vial.

Her rasped gratitude went unregistered by my mind except for the pleasantly warm feeling in my chest. How long had I hoped Sugu would stop calling me 'big brother' and realise I was her 'big sister'? How long had I endured our grandfather's beatings because I could never satisfy him, even when I went above and beyond what he told me to succeed in at kendo? The shouting and beating when I snapped that I was his 'granddaughter' and not his 'grandson'?

…How long had I been trying to convince and make everyone realise that my name was Kirigaya Kyori and not Kirigaya Kazuto? And how long had it been since Suguha stood in front of me, facing our grandfather, declaring that she'd take my spot and work twice as hard for the both of us with me on my hands and knees sobbing behind her—when I'd realised I was wrong, broken, meant to be Kirigaya Kazuto and Suguha's big brother that was supposed to protect her from all sorts of pain and suffering—when I'd realised I failed.

In that instant… that moment, at the bedside of a little NPC girl that  _wasn't real didn't remind me of my little sister didn't call me big sister called me big brother like I was supposed to be_ …

I fell apart.

My knees hit the ground. My head fell into the little girl's bed. My body shook—wracked with sobs and phantom pains and  _stop stop grandfather please stop I'm trying what did I do please get away from me get away I can't breathe I can't think please stop_ —

I wasn't there. I wasn't in «Sword Art Online», what was supposed to be my escape from the real world, what was supposed to be where I was «Kirito», the strong hero that saved and protected the weak and led a guild of knights to the Ruby Palace where the «Demonic Lord, Azazel» ruled the «Floating Castle of Aincrad» with his horde of demonic monsters.

But instead I was  _here_ , here in this  _fucking_ Hell called a  _game_ , on my knees sobbing painfully into an NPC six year-old's bed, wanting to just go home, to go see my mom and my little sister again, to fix myself and heal and go to school and make friends and just be  _normal_. I was the same broken weakling that was fucking Kirigaya Kyori but was supposed to be Kirigaya Kazuto, that cried when people asked her questions, that threw up and fainted and screamed and sobbed in a classroom because there was more than eight people in it and had more than one conversation going on around me at one time, that didn't  _know_  how to talk to people and could never figure out how she  _no fucking_ _ **he**_  was supposed to feel how react or act in a situation that didn't involve answering school questions or working on a computer or holding a shinai.

I was here, sobbing into the bed of a sick and immobile NPC girl the same way that my mom and my little sister probably were in real life and  _God DAMN IT Why Would Someone Do This To Other Human Beings Kayaba Akihiko!_

"What's the matter big ' _ **brother**_ '."  _Not sister not sister not sister she said brother not sister I'm a big brother I'm a Big Brother_

A soft palm touched my head.

That soft palm touching my head started stroking my hair as I cried. Over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over.

That soft palm touching my head stroked my hair as I cried over and over and over and over until I passed out.

* * *

_**«Secret Medicine of the Forest** **» completed, +3000 EXP, +1** _ _**«** _ _**Anneal Blade** _ _**»** _

_**Congratulations! You've levelled up to level four! +6SP, +1** _ _**«Skill Slot** _ _**»** _

_And thus, the first night of Sword Art Online's official online launch, draws to a close._

_Current death toll: 737_

* * *

**_Player Name- Kirito_ **  
**Player Level- 4**  
**_HP- 540/540  
_ _EXP- 4592/4800_**

**_Equipment:_ **

**_Cloth Shirt (F)- +0pts armour_ **  
**_Linen Vest (F)- +2pts armour_**  
**_Leather Half Coat (F)- +6pts armour_**  
**_Linen Pants (F)- +1pts armour  
_ _Leather Boots (F)- +2pts armour, +2 movement speed_**

**_Stats:  
6SP_ **

**_Strength- +2_ **  
**_Vitality- +0_**  
**_Intelligence- +1_**  
**_Agility- +5  
_ _Dexterity- +0_**

**_Skills:_ **

**_One-handed Sword- 9/1000  
_ **_**Searching- 13/1000**  
_ _**«** _ **_Empty Skill Slot_ ** _**»** _

**_Recent Activity-  
_ **

**_Levelled up to level 4_ **

**_Received «Anneal Blade»_ **

**_Turned in «Secret Medicine of the Forest»_ **

**_Gained «Little Nepenthe's Ovule»_ **

**_Levelled up to level 3_ **

**_«Searching» has levelled up to level 13_ **

**_«One-handed Sword» has levelled up to level 9_ **

**_Friends Online- 0_ **

**_Active Parties- 0_ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And thus comes the new tags.


	3. Intermission: Medai

Clicking my tongue, I ducked back into the shadows of «Medai's» alleyways, drawing my cloak close to me. It's only been two weeks since «Sword Art Online» officially launched, two weeks since Kayaba Akihiko announced the game's existence as the «new reality» for 20,000 people—and as a «death game».

And already over five-thousand players have died.

Almost all of the beta testers, players that thought they could party together and handle the «First Floor» without the consideration of the regular players, died only a couple weeks into the game—672 of 1,000 beta testers dead. Almost two thousand of the five-thousand-person figure occurred in the first two days of the game's launch. Suicides, all of them.

The «Floating City of Aincrad» had no ground below the first floor, so if a player were to jump off the edge they'd hit the edge of the playing bounds and instantly all of their HP would drain to zero. Almost every player that'd committed suicide by this point—two-thousand people—considered Kayaba to be lying and believed that they'd wake up in the real world if they'd died. We, of course, have no way to prove whether it worked or not—but their lack of reappearance in the game makes me, personally, think that Kayaba wasn't lying.

I'd already decided he was telling the truth when «Coper» was killed by the «Little Nepenthes» in the forests outside «Horunka» after he'd tried to MPK me.

The rest of the death toll came primarily by mob deaths. Area bosses, solo players and parties get in over their heads in how many mobs they could fight at once with the arrogance that came from increasing your STR and «Sword Skills» in a game where the game would take care of most of your fighting for you.

Thankfully I've not heard anything yet about deaths via player-killing—PKing—but I knew that wouldn't last. Not everybody would believe that death in the game was actual death in real life, and wouldn't feel bad about killing some low levelled players for vastly more EXP than most of the «First Floor» mobs dropped (a PK, even of a level one player, gave the killer almost 250EXP—the «Ruin Kobold Sentinels», the highest levelled standard mobs on the first floor, only gave 47EXP), and PKing was a tradition in MMOs. Then there'd be people that would rationalise their killings as Kayaba being the one that murdered them IRL, not them—cowards that just wanted to feel powerful and feel the excitement of battle in virtual reality while not holding themselves accountable for the effects their actions had in physical reality.

Then there'd be the players that PKed purely for access to the «Secret Skills» that red players—players that have killed other green players and gotten their cursers permanently coloured orange—had access to. I didn't know much about them, considering I'd only been a red player a few times, and if you were to pay off your crime to a GM (in Col) your status would be reset in twenty-four hours—but PKing a green player gave access to a large variety of special skills that aided red players either in killing more or surviving without NPC services, or even allowing them to get NPC services for a set amount of time that increased as the skill levelled up.

But…

Even with the lack of deaths due to PKing, already hopes were running on almost empty. In two weeks, most of the first floor had been mapped by scouts and players that had taken up the mantle of «Clearers»—but the location of the first floor «labyrinth» is still unknown to us. Even to the beta testers—Kayaba and his dev team had moved the locations of the labyrinths for this launch. And every day that went by where we didn't know where to go to clear the first floor, more and more people dropped from the «Clearers» and dropped back to one of the four towns on the first floor to try to roll as a trade player.

Regardless, I doubt knowing where the labyrinth would help much at this point anyway. Because of hints from Argo (and my own arrogance) I felt fairly comfortable about the fact that I was one of the highest levelled players on the 'frontlines' right now—and I'd only barely gotten to level seven last night.

Sword Art Online's experience system was structured in such a way that it would incentivise players to do quests (sometimes repeatedly) or party together to do a dungeon crawl, area boss, or labyrinth raid. Killing mobs rarely gave much EXP—on the first floor it would range from 8EXP to 47EXP, whereas most of the starting quests spread across the towns on the first floor gave 3,000EXP to 4,000EXP for quest completion. And by the time you get to level six, a quest on the first floor would only just get you to level seven—and then you'd need to do at least two quests for a single level up (the requirement for level eight was 4,500EXP).

The recommended absolute lowest level for a labyrinth raid on the «First Floor Labyrinth» was level ten—meaning at least forty-eight players would need to grind at least 35,200EXP just to be able to have a chance at fighting the boss. Any lower and you'd have lower crit chances and hits on the boss, «Illfang, the Kobold Lord», would drain more durability than usual.

I'd been spending the last several days in Medai, the smallest of the four towns situated one the first floor, while also being the shadiest of the four. Whereas the City of Beginnings and «Tolbana» were large, sprawling towns and «Horunka» was a homey village—Medai was basically just a system of interconnected, shadowy alleyways through and surrounding a tiny market. The only NPC stalls in the market were a rather simple smithy and an apothecary with a fair handful of empty stalls meant for player owned stalls—more of an ideal for black market player trade than either of the other three towns.

The player owned stalls in Medai typically sold rare drops, dungeon loot, or area boss weapons from across the first floor for a price premium—in some ways a preferable method to get decent gear instead of mob grinding or risking your life to clear a dungeon or challenge an area boss on your own.

Medai was also the town that offered the best quests for training the more thief oriented skills—«Hiding», «Looting», «Lock Picking», «Thrifting», etc. And many of the items you'd get either on the quest or as a quest reward were geared towards solo players and stealth builds, like my «Cloak of Shadow Melding»—a hooded cloak that increased a player's stealth stat, a hidden system stat, by a noticeable +15, and offered a +4 buff to a player's «Hiding» skill.

Making my way through one of Medai's alleyways, I found myself standing outside a player owned tavern—«The Whispering Rat».

_She better be here_.

Two nights ago I'd received a PM from Argo telling me to meet her at her tavern to 'discuss important information', something she frequently did during the beta whenever an interesting quest popped up or she'd found a way to get a secret skill that would benefit my play style.

_But… what sort of information could be important for the first floor? Did she find more beta changes?_

I lowered my hood and stepped through the door—Argo had never been the kind of person to waste someone's time, and in a situation like this new «Sword Art Online»… I couldn't see her changing how she works in that aspect. The inside of the tavern was practically empty—a few tables and chairs, a bar, and a backroom assumedly for private meetings Argo or someone in her network would want to hold. There were only a few other players in the tavern, all of them wearing similar cloaks to my own—agents in Argo's network, probably.

"There ya' are, Kiibou!"

Stepping out of the backroom, Argo looked just as she did in the beta—short curly auburn hair, teasingly warm brown eyes, a full set of «leather armour» (payment for info probably) with her own «Cloak of Shadow Melding», and those whiskers on her face.

For the life of me I need to find out why she has those…

She walked up to me slowly, lips curling into a teasing grin while taking in my appearance.

"'f I didn't know you were the only person I was expecting this early, I'd barely recognise you. The black is all the same, but the hair? Longer than I'd've ever expected from ya'."

"…Ashley was insistent, and I don't have the «Hair Styling» sub-skill."

Ashley, one of the surviving 328 beta testers and the most famous tailor from the beta test—not like that was saying much. I'd ran into her last week when I made my way to Tolbana, and after seeing my new avatar, she practically payed  _me_  to let her change my hair. Thankfully it wasn't significantly longer, just reaching the nape of my neck, but it was significantly wavier with far more layers than I've ever had.

I hated it, and I hated the warm feeling I felt in my chest every time I saw myself in the mirror. But without the «Hair Styling» sub-skill, there was no way for me to change it back to a hair style I was more comfortable in (ignoring how painful that comfort was, for some reason), and speccing into the «Beautician» skill branch was a waste of «Status Points» just for something like that.

I'll just beg and pay her to turn it back next time I'm in Tolbana.

Argo let out her signature laugh and sharpened her grin. Did she really wear her teeth with canines in the game? Was that even a cosmetic option? I don't remember having to do anything with the scan that would store tooth data…

"So, guess we learnt wha' would happen 'f ya' skipped tha' genitalia when scannin', eh?"

"…You said you had information for me?"

Argo's posture tightened and lost any hint of humour, her eyes freezing over and face turning stiff. She spun on her heel and waved me towards the backroom with a 'come with me'. I nodded my head to the few agents from the beta that Argo had in her 'guild' (not really an official guild, as guilds couldn't officially form until the fourth floor—and the guild leader will have needed to finish the «Elf War» campaign on the «Third Floor») and followed the girl into her backroom—which really looked more like an interrogation chamber. All she had in it was a single long table with a chair on either side, and the table had papers scattered all over it.

"What's this?"

"A sort of guide, made from information compiled from other beta testers, meant to help newbie players avoid high level zones and make use out of their sword skills more efficiently." Her voice was exhausted, both physically and mentally, and completely absent of her usual accent. She sighed and laid her face in her hands after she sat down. "We've… already lost a lot of people because they didn't know how to play the game and didn't have much of a chance to learn before this whole death game nonsense started."

"How do we know how many people have died? I only know from hearsay, and I'm not wholly sure that's reliable info."

"The «Monument of Life» in the former «Room of Resurrection»—it has the name of all 20,000 players on it. The dead ones are crossed out with their time and cause of death. A virtual display above it shows how many players are left, and I've got newbie agents practically camped out in the room to give me exact information."

That… that was grim. A horrible mockery of the truth of our situation. "A wall of the living and the dead in the room where players were supposed to respawn?" I could barely believe it, and if I didn't know Argo would never lie, I probably wouldn't. "How… evil."

"It's disgusting is what it is." The words were vehemently spat. "«Sword Art Online» was advertised as an escape fantasy from reality for people that were dissatisfied with their stake in the real world, that would shell out ten-thousands of yen just for the equipment to run the game, all for a few hours a day of escape from it all. And then Kayaba and his team go and turn it into a second reality, ruining any sort of escapism, while parading as some sort of hero and saviour of the masses?"

A monster.

Argo sighed again, fight her body drooping as all fight left her.

"We need to keep people alive as much as possible, give them the tools for their survival. In current times we need a collective front that can push against whatever Hell Kayaba plans to throw at us. And right now—"

"Right now, there's a growing rift between the beta testers and the regular players."

Argo nodded, shuffling the papers on the table around. The rift between the beta testers and the regular players was a rift that had always existed—arguments on forums about how it was unfair that Argus was allowing beta testers to play the game, especially as most of the beta testers ended up being streamers and people that primarily play games in their days for a living, instead of regular people that have nine-to-fives and would likely only spend a few hours in the game and reviewers that would have other games they'd need to play and review, so wouldn't be likely to be in the game often post release. Said it gave the beta testers too much of an informational advantage.

It'd only grown worse since launch.

"I've been hoping that this information manual will be enough for tensions to settle a little." Her voice trailed off. "…We may need something a bit more. A guide is good and all, but it doesn't help everyone, and so long as people are dying while known beta testers are out of sight, there will always be that rift and distrust."

"…"

Argo was right, of course.

And I hated the implications of the direction this conversation would be going.

"…I'm involved in this 'something a bit more', aren't I."

"You're a necessary piece for what I have planned."

I… really hate being right.

I sighed tiredly, finally taking a seat in the chair across from Argo, and looked into her eyes.

"Alright… what's the plan."

* * *

**_Player Name- Kirito_**  
**_Player Level- 7_**  
**_HP- 870/870  
_ _EXP- 11,628/15,700_**

**_Equipment:_ **

_**Cloth Shirt (F)- +0pts armour**  
_**_Leather Cuirass (F)- +8pts armour  
_ _Leather Half Coat (F)- +6pts armour  
_ _Leather Trousers (F)- +1pts armour  
_ **_**Leather Boots (F)- +2pts armour, +2 movement speed**  
_ _**«** **Anneal Blade (+2)** **»- (12*One-handed Sword*STR)pts damage  
** _ _**«** **Cloak of Shadow Melding** **»- +1pts armour, +4** _ **_«Hiding_** __ **»** , **+15 Stealth**

**_Stats:_ **

_**Strength- +7**  
_ _**Vitality- +4**  
_ _**Intelligence- +5**  
_ **_Agility- +12  
_ ** **Dexterity- +2**

**_Skills:_ **

_**One-handed Sword- 31/1000**  
_ _**Searching- 58/1000**  
_ **_Hiding- 40*/1000 (_ ** **_*_ ** _**«Cloak of Shadow Melding** **» +4)  
** _ **_Cooking- 18/1000_**

**_Recent Activity-_ **

_**«** **Argo** **» added to Friends List** _

**_Friends Online- 1/1_ **

_**«Argo** **»** _

**_Active Parties- 0/0_ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just an intermission this chapter. I started it up not exactly having a plan but wanted to show off Medai, and since we don't really know... anything about it besides that it exists, I decided to make it the sort of place that thief/stealth type builds would gravitate to, and would be an obvious location for a player run sort of "black market".
> 
> Next chapter should be started Aria in the Starless Night, which I'm looking forward to, 'cause it's where I fell off of writing Kuroi Kenshi almost six years ago.


	4. The Dulled Flash

The first fight I had in the beta test of «Sword Art Online» that actually challenged me was… exhilarating. Never before had I imagined that I could feel that alive with a sword in my hand, never thought that I'd feel so…  _alive_  in a seemingly life or death fight, even knowing that my 'death' would just mean some dropped loot and Col, and respawning in the «Room of Resurrection».

The first fight I had in the official launch of Sword Art Online that actually challenged me, however… was terrifying. An  _actual_  battle for life or death—while it gave me a much larger and more euphoric rush, it also mentally exhausted me far more than any fight in the beta ever had. The efficiency you attain from knowing that the littlest mistake or misstep could be the death of you was draining.

…Or at least, the efficiency you  _should_  attain.

This current fight between the level six «Ruin Kobold Trooper» and a cloaked player Argo led me towards certainly looked efficient to the untrained eye. The player was accurately and effectively dodging the strikes of their opponents, attacking during the recharge time or during a stagger, and kiting the rest to repeat the process. A 'good fight', I'm certain someone like Klein would say. The strikes were fast, ended the fight as soon as possible, and the player almost never got hit.

But they were using only system assisted «Sword Skills». Because of my knowledge of how the system assist functioned I learnt how to avoid the system assist while still maintaining the damage output of a fully charged sword skill—but that was clearly not the case for this player. They held the stance for the basic rapier sword skill «Linear» just a little too long, and while I couldn't see the actual blade, I could easily see the trajectory of the light cast by the fully charged sword skill. Certainly, impressive for a rookie—but she used it again.

And again.

…And again.

And it was this fact that worried me.

Sword skills, when making use of the NerveGear's «system assist», require an incredible amount of concentration at lower levels—it wasn't until around +35 INT that a player could reliably spam system assist sword skills without needing to factor in the concentration required. And the drain normally wasn't a negligible one—already I could see the player's strikes slowing.

Luckily for them, I'd taken care of the rest of the pop and we were close enough to a «Safe Zone» outside of the cave, so they wouldn't need to worry about taking on more Troopers.

…Except they didn't move towards the entrance of the cave. They moved to go deeper, leaning against one of the walls to catch their breath.

Normally I'd leave and find my own prey for the night. Not a method I quite preferred, but after that first day… besides a meeting with Argo and some player traders, I'd not approached a single player. Since leaving Klein and hearing the dying screams and begging of Coper… I'd selfishly lived as a solo player. Even when I saw another player in danger, I'd been unable to bring myself to leave the shadows to help them.

But this rookie… Even though they weren't in visible danger, and probably wouldn't die in the next several encounters (HP still near full)… I promised Argo. And so, after several seconds of deliberation and mental preparation, I left the shadows of the intersection and strode toward the now sitting rapier user.

Their torso was equipped with a crimson leather tunic and a light weight copper breast plate, dressed in neat leather pants and a pair of combat boots. The figure was wearing a hooded cloak, similar enough to my «Cloak of Shadow Mending»—fully hiding his face from view. Apart from the cloak, their equipment seemed very similar to that of a fencer—very similar to my own equipment as a swordsman. Because of the weight of the «Anneal Blade» I wear very little armour—a small chest guard over my own dark blue leather tunic and underneath my cloak.

Deactivating my Cloak and my «Hiding» skill, I let the sound of my heavy leather boots clicking against the dense stone echo through the cavernous room. At the sound the rapier user's shoulders trembled, as if she thought I was a monster. But why? My cursor was the same bright green as hers, and the cursor of every player was permanently visible unless they were making use of particularly high levelled Hiding skill. The rapier user had their face buried deep behind their knees, giving a strong 'just pass by and move on' impression.

I stopped right in front of them and opened my mouth—always my first mistake on meeting new people.

"That was an extreme overkill."

…Real comforting words there  _Kazuto_.

The slim shoulders, covered by the thick cloth of the cloak, shifted slightly. The hood jerked, moved up a few centimetres, and from the darkness two pupils sharply shot towards me. The only thing I could discern was the narrowed hazel of her eyes—the shape of the face couldn't be seen at all. For a few seconds, they sat and watched me with that same sharp glare they'd worn in the prior battle… but then their head titled slightly.

Ah… an MMO rookie. Wonderful—thanks Argo.

While MMO rookies weren't exactly rare in MMOs, even Sword Art Online—a few of the beta testers that had never played an MMO before and only played a few lighter RPGs, seeing a solo player that was also a rookie was incredibly uncommon. And one so skilled…

The «Linear» release was so perfect I couldn't resist a shiver. The conciseness of the pre-motion and the post-motion… the speed of the thrust… Only once before have I beheld such a terrifying sword skill execution, but that was in the real world.

I'd originally thought they were a beta tester like I was—that they'd practiced for endless hours to attain that speed and form like I had. But after seeing the Linear the second time, I started to doubt that. «Minimal Side Step Defence» certainly had its advantages—a higher counterattack speed over parrying or blocking, and it wouldn't decrease armour or weapon durability at the same speed. But the technique was incredibly risky—the kind of thing someone with a glass cannon build like myself would make use of, it was risky for rookie MMO players to practice in live battle situations, especially when the battle situation was in a  _death game_.

Prioritising maximum DPS with minimal movement over defence—if a hit were to miss or the opponent were to move slightly faster than the attacker with a prioritised attack then the attacker would be hit with counter-damage and would risk being stunned. And for solo players, «stun» status effects are almost always fatal.

Because of that… I was curious. Even with my misgivings towards sword skills, I knew that this rapier user had perfected their movements for readying and finishing a sword skill and given enough time they could probably make use of non-assisted sword skills like me. But pairing that with the risky defensive tactics… I was interested. Being honest with myself, that was the biggest reason I moved closer and stated the overkill.

Hyper obsessiveness and fixation I tell ya'.

However the other player didn't seem to understand the MMO term. I took a short breath and explained. "'Overkill' means… in comparison to the enemy's remaining HP, the damage dealt was way too much. The Kobold Trooper earlier was practically dead after the  _second_  Linear." I shook my head. "No, your victory was already practically guaranteed after the  _first_. Its HP was only at 35%, a few well-placed regular attacks would have been more than enough."

That… was the most I've spoken since that first night. Unused the voice in this new body, and having nobody really to talk to, I'd tried to be as silent as possible since Coper's death. How many weeks has it been since said more than a sentence or two in conversation?

Being a solo player was both a virtue and a curse. It meant no pain of having to watch friends die, saving you from having to look after others that were much lower level or of severely lower skill. Kept you from having to care—and in a death game, being able to fixate on surviving helped distract from the loneliness caused from being solo.

Granted… my experience of playing solo was in MMOs where I wasn't spending twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, logged in. Being alone for a few days at a time was one thing, I was used to that. But for almost an entire month… for someone that already had issues understanding social cues and understanding other people, that level of isolation was incredibly harmful to social growth and development—removing any reason to survive and complete this… ' _game_ '.

"Overkill… is there any problem with it?"

Finally they— _she_ —spoke. Spoke a question… I really didn't need to answer. Obviously she could fight and stay alive on her own—it wasn't my responsibility to teach her how to stay alive in this Hellish prison. But… a part of me, some part that was desperate for interaction that my little sister had filled and watered for several years to try to help me grow, couldn't stop me from answering her.

"Overkill has… not penalty or demerit, no. But… it's bad for efficiency. System assisted sword skills require concentration, using them continuously is mentally exhausting." I stopped to make sure she was paying some level of attention. "You also need to consider the return path—"

"Return path?"

I stopped. "…Yes…" I drew out. "The exit to the dungeon is about twenty, thirty minutes from here. And from there «Tolbana» is about two hours away, even for high AGI players like you and I. Exhaustion increases mistakes, and for solo players like us, even the slightest mistake can be fatal."

Finally having a chance to observe my voice, I noticed how… soft it was—my real voice was naturally soft already, from being young and rarely speaking as it is. But it was still noticeably masculine. This new avatar's voice… was definitely very effeminate.

Why did… why did I feel warm realising that?

"…Then there's no problem, I'm not returning."

She broke me out of my thoughts.

"What?" I asked dumbfoundedly. "N… not returning to town? But… but healing potions, equipment repairing, sleep… You  _need_  these things in this world."

"I don't need medicines when I'm not taking damage," she said, like a  _smart aleck_. "And I brought five of the same sword. There's a «Safe Area» a few minutes that way, so I can rest there."

…

Safe areas were special rooms in dungeons that monsters couldn't enter, and where players couldn't cause harm to each other—easily recognisable by a special coloured torch placed on the walls of its corners. It was a wonderful place to rest while hunting and mapping—to catch a breather and restore whatever health you might have lost. But it was awful for any sort of  _actual_  resting—made of cold stone with no bed, and sleeping bags weren't provided by NPC stores or available for crafting by players until around the fourth floor. And of course, you could still hear the footsteps and growls of the nearby mobs—on top of sensing their murderous intent.

Actual sleep was just absolutely impossible and prolonged time being awake was mentally… exhausting…

"…How many hours have you  _been_  here?" My voice shook and was filled with fear and worry. Don't… don't say…

She took a deep breath. "Three… maybe four days?" Damn it no,  _no, no_ … "Is that all? The monsters around here should spawn soon."

She pushed off the wall and stood up shakily. The rapier, which was still drawn, dropped heavily as if she were trying to wield a two-handed sword with one hand. Her cloak, I could see now, was in tatters—the fact that it was still intact at all was a miracle. For cloth equipment, four day expeditions without any sort of repair from a tailor was… it shouldn't have been  _possible_.

For as arrogant as it made her sound, her 'when I'm not taking damage'  _has_  to have been true.

Suddenly, before I could even process what I was doing, my hand snapped out and grabbed her wrist to keep her from moving forward. "If you fight like that you  _will_  die."

The rapier user made no movement for a few seconds, and suddenly she was turning her neck to look at me. From under the hood, I could see her red and black rimmed hazel eyes gazing at me.

"…Everyone wild die in the end anyway."

… _Ah._

"In just one month,  _7000_  people have died, and not even this floor has been cleared. It isn't possible to clear this game. Where and how you die… the only difference is when it will happen."

_He's right, but…_

Suddenly, the rapier user seemed to have been struck by an unseen paralyzing attack and slowly sank to the floor. I cursed silently as she suddenly collapsed. Why,  _why_  did she think it was a good idea to stay in this dungeon for  _four days_? As she fell to the ground, I ran up and caught her body in my arms.

I suddenly wished I'd chosen to roll 2:1 STR/AGI build and not a 2:1 AGI/STR build.

I sighed as I heaved the body onto my back—which wasn't much of an easy task. As an AGI/STR build at level nine, with ten STR to my sixteen AGI, lifting other players and carrying them efficiently while avoiding mobs (even with my Cloak and Hiding skill) was… a challenge.

I had to get us out of here as soon as possible though. If she was right then more mobs would be spawning here soon—while the Kobold class of monsters weren't the most challenging outside of the boss room, fighting became exponentially harder when you're carrying and trying to protect an unconscious player on your back as well. After a couple minutes of walking I felt the fencer's breathing start to even.

_Good… she's asleep._

In the distance I heard the tell-tale spawning of monsters not too far away. 'Kay… really gotta' move it if I want to avoid a fight.

It wasn't much longer until we made it out of the dungeon and into the forest surrounding the path leading back to town. Finding my way to a random clearing, I placed the rapier user onto the ground and found a nearby tree to lay against while waiting for her to wake up.

In the silence of the night, gazing up at the stars through the canopy of the forest, with the soft breathing of the sleeping rapier user next to me the only presence to keep me company, I wondered.

_Why is she… is she really so willing to give up her life in this new reality?_

As much as I didn't want to accept it—or maybe it's because I really  _did_  want to accept it but didn't want to admit it—«Sword Art Online»  _is_  our reality now. And to be so willing to just give that up…

… _Why doesn't she want to live Here?_

Here where the weak can be strong, where the worthless can belong, where we all spent tens of thousands of yen just to have first day. Why would she want to give up her life Here?

* * *

_**User Name: Kirito** _  
_**Character Level: 9**_  
_**HP: 930/930** _  
_**EXP: 24,558/30,700** _

_**Equipment:** _

_**Cloth Shirt (F)- +0pts armour** _  
_**Light Iron Cuirass (+3)- +20pts armour** _  
_**Leather Coat (F)- 6pts armour** _  
_**Leather Trousers (F)- +3pts armour** _  
_**Leather Boots (F)- +2pts armour, +2 movement speed** _  
_**«Anneal Blade (+6)»- (20*One-handed Sword*STR)pts damage  
«Cloak of Shadow Melding (+4)»- +4pts armour, +9 «Hiding», +18 Stealth** _

_**Stats:** _

_**Strength- +10** _  
_**Vitality- +7** _  
_**Intelligence- +8** _  
_**Agility- +16  
Dexterity- +2** _

_**Skills:** **  
** _

__**One-handed Sword- 48/1000  
** **Searching- 72/1000  
** **Hiding- 55*/1000 (*«Cloak of Shadow Melding» +9)  
** **Cooking: 25/1000**

_**Friends Online- 2/2** _

_**«Argo»  
** _ _**«Diabel»** _

_**Active Parties- 0/0** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter-I wanted to stop before I got to doing Asuna' POV for the beginning of the next chapter. Gonna' be starting to go a little of canon in characterisation, interactions, and the progression of events starting around the time of the boss meeting. Meanwhile I'm also trying to balance my numbers to make progression not seem too fast. I've officially written more of The Black Blade, Reforged in under a week than I did of Kuroi Kenshi in a whole two months six years ago, and I feel pretty good about that.
> 
> Hope you all enjoyed the chapter, and I'll be getting to work on the next chapter almost immediately upon posting this one.


End file.
